Why is financial inclusion so popular? An analysis of development buzzwords

Abstract

AbstractWe analyse the popularity of the term ‘financial inclusion’ in relation to other development buzzwords. We extract trend data for multiple development buzzwords across countries and cities from 2004 to 2022, and we run a series of empirical analyses. We find that the ‘financial inclusion’ buzzword is popular because the term ‘financial inclusion’ is correlated with other development buzzwords, particularly ‘microfinance’, ‘digital finance’, ‘inclusive finance’, ‘financial exclusion’ and ‘Fintech’ buzzwords. Financial inclusion buzzword is more popular in developing countries than in developed countries. Financial inclusion buzzword is also popular in major cities in developing countries. We also observe that the financial inclusion buzzword was more popular during the second wave of the COVID‐19 pandemic. There is uni‐directional causality between interest in financial inclusion and interest in fintech and inclusive finance, indicating that interest in financial inclusion buzzword causes interest in fintech and inclusive finance buzzword. There is also uni‐directional causality between interest in financial exclusion and interest in financial inclusion. Finally, there is a significant correlation between interest in the ‘financial inclusion’, ‘digital finance’, ‘inclusive finance’ and ‘Fintech’ buzzwords.